Re: Increase default `line-spacing' to 0.05, 0.10 or 0.15 [proposal]

[Stefan Kangas]

Augusto Stoffel <arstoffel@gmail.com> writes:

> In normal typography you are free to choose how much space to add
> between lines, but the horizontal condensedness is a fixed
> characteristic of the font.

In a sense, you are free to choose vertical spacing however you want.
But a lot of time and effort has been invested into figuring out how to
choose line height (leading) wisely.  It is generally a good idea to try
to adhere to such best practices.

In body text, horizontal spacing is generally determined by the typeface
itself.  However, in certain situations we do need to use kerning, and
even tracking (letter-spacing).  So I don't exactly understand why you
consider this more of a "fixed characteristic" than vertical spacing.

For me it is almost the other way around: you set the line height
(leading) depending on variables such as the x-height of the font,
column width, etc.  And then you tend to never change it anywhere in the
document (book, website, etc.).  Whereas the horizontal spacing might
indeed vary in different paragraphs and lines.

(In print production, it is very common to change the letter-spacing
(tracking) by as much as 10 % in an entire paragraph, for example to
avoid "widows" in a book.  For small caps the guidelines of one large
publishing house that I've read recommends 60 % tracking as a
*minimum*.)

> It seems to me that for monospaced fonts the vertical condensedness is
> pretty much fixed by the font design as well.
>
> For instance, in monospaced fonts the descender of "g" tends to look a
> bit squished.  This is a compromise; if the font designer wanted to make
> the font vertically more sparse, they might as well have given the
> descender a bit more room.

I agree that monospaced fonts are often designed to work even in
situations where there is no extra leading.  That doesn't mean that this
is the optimal choice for such fonts.

A font designer does determine the x-height of the font, but this is not
the only variable in putting characters on screen.  Whoever does the
final design will still have to chose the line height.

Here is a long quote from /The Elements of Typographic Style/ by Robert
Bringhurst, as food for thought:

    2.2.1 Choose a basic leading that suits the typeface, text and
    measure.

    Time is divisible into any number of increments.  So is space.
    But for working purposes, time in music is divided into a few
    proportional intervals: halves, quarters, eighths, sixteenths and so
    on.  And time in most music is measured.  Add a quarter note to a
    bar whose time is already accounted for and, somewhere nearby,
    the equivalent of that quarter note must come out.  Phrasing and
    rhythm can move in and out of phase - as they do in the singing
    of Billie Holiday and the trumpet solos of Miles Davis - but the
    force of blues phrasing and syncopation vanishes if the beat is
    actually lost.

    Space in typography is like time in music.  It is infinitely
    divisible, but a few proportional intervals can be much more useful
    than a limitless choice of arbitrary quantities.  The metering of
    horizontal space is accomplished almost unconsciously in typography.
    You choose and prepare a font, and you choose a measure (the width
    of the column).  When you set the type, the measure fills with the
    varied rhythm of repeating letter shapes, which are music to the
    eye.  Vertical space is metered in a different way.  You must choose
    not only the overall measure - the depth of the column or page - but
    also a basic rhythmical unit.  This unit is the leading, which is the
    distance from one baseline to the next.

    Eleven-point type set solid is described as 11/11.  The theoretical
    face of the type is 11 points high (from the top of d to the bottom
    of p, if the type is full on the body), and the distance from the
    baseline of line one to the baseline of line two is also 11
    points.  Add two points of lead (interlinear space), and the type is
    set 11/13.  The type size has not changed, but the distance from
    baseline to baseline has increased to 13 points, and the type has
    more room to breathe.

    The text of the book you are reading, to take an example, is
    set 10/12 x 21.  This means that the type size is 10 pt, the added
    lead is 2 pt, giving a total leading of 12 pt, and the line length is
    21 picas.

    Continuous text is very rarely set with negative leading, and only a
    few text faces read well when set solid.  Most text requires
    positive leading.  Settings such as 9/11, 10/12, 11/13 and 12/15 are
    routine.  Longer measures need more lead than short ones.  Dark
    faces need more lead than light ones.  Large-bodied faces need more
    lead than smaller-bodied ones.  Faces like Bauer Bodoni, with
    substantial color and a rigid vertical axis, need much more lead
    than faces like Bembo, whose color is light and whose axis is based
    on the writing hand.  And unserifed faces often need more lead (or a
    shorter line) than their serifed counterparts. Extra leading is also
    generally welcome where the text is thickened by superscripts,
    subscripts, mathematical expressions, or the frequent use of full
    capitals.  A text in German would ideally have a little more lead
    than the same text in Latin or French, purely because of the
    increased frequency of capitals.